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It baffles me how Mondayitis is a yet to be recognised medical condition when so many suffer from it. This morning, on the pretence of getting my script-filled for a new contraceptive pill, I managed to lose whole blocks of time just wandering around aisles. Meanwhile my brain was busy making a list of all the things I have to get done by the end of today: a post for this blog, another chapter for my third book, vacuuming the carpets and grocery shopping for dinner…

Unbelievably, I was also entertaining the thought of an extended morning coffee with some stranger or other that merges into lunch! So what is it about Mondays that throws everyone into a funk or is this just an excuse for adults to fob off work and throw tantrums? And why is it Fridays and Saturdays are most people’s favourite days of the week when the average work week has gone from Monday to Friday to all seven days with more and more holding down at least two jobs?

My theory is that with our increasingly busy lives, the only times anyone gets rest is during public holidays when all the stores are shut and by virtue of there being no where to go, we are forced to sit and vegetate at home. Mondayitis recalls an era when yawning on a Monday morning and dragging one’s feet was the ultimate rebellion against enslavement by work. Today, work is supposed to be something you enjoy and as such, Mondayitis is just about delaying productivity, as moi is doing spectacularly well! Here’s Garfield expounding my feelings exactly.

The title may come back to bite me, but last night, on the way to a post-FRACS exam celebratory dinner with His Royal Highness, he said to me, “I heard from someone you have a blog.”

Knowing that any number of mutual friends could have told him, I said, “Yes. It appears I’m on to my tenth career.”

Ten being an exaggeration, since I consider the hundred other little ventures I’ve embarked on to be hobbies. To call them careers would imply that I actually made any money. “Why, do you have a problem with that?”

His Royal Highness could hardly have issues with my hobby since I have been so patient with his: surgery. Occasionally he likes to remind me that when we met, I was a journo. Perhaps I should tell him that writing news for TV doesn’t count as journalism since my print-news friend said so. Or maybe not, since this is a monarch who enjoys catching just about every bulletin from any of the free-to-air channels when he is home.

Since our marriage, I’ve hauled around a briefcase full of soap and alkali-testing tape in an attempt to convert half the student population of Clayton to Nuskin, sold Pashmina scarfs with a friend on eBay when it was still going for $300 each at David Jones, match-made everyone from my neighbour’s cat to Tom, Dick and Harry for free… Then around my twenty-ninth birthday, I picked up the pen again, or in a twenty-first century version of an eighteenth century story, glued my bottom to a chair in front of His Royal Highness’ ancient PC and began banging away at the keyboard, much to his chagrin.

“When will you be done?” he would ask.

“I don’t know.” So I had to tell him I was writing a book.

That one book became two, and now that I am hovering around four thousand words on my third one, I’m here smoking the peace pipe and communing with my fellow netizens via this blog.

I know this title is bound to get under the skin of some househusbands, or wives of househusbands. But trust me, it has nothing to with people of either gender staying home to cook, clean and care for their family all day. It is about husbands who ordinarily go to work between the hours of nine and five, from Monday to Friday, staying home.

They may be sick, or in need of a day off, or like mine, about to sit for the Fellowship exam of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons for the fourth time, but the one thing they have in common is that they expect you to put your day on hold, just because they are around. If unwell, they’ll whine like they are the first persons in the history of the world to ever have a cough, cold or a mild temperature. Fair enough if they have cancer, but the average husband who chucks a sickie doesn’t have that.

Sometimes they just feel like staying home. I’m all for spending time on the couch and holding hands but when they want to do it from drop off until pick up from school? Sometimes they don’t even want to hold hands. They just want you to drop everything, and I mean everything, to hear them whine about life, their hairline, their waistline, their work, while you wonder who’s going to pick up the bread and milk and put the trash out. I get that they want to connect and communicate like I’m doing now, but can we do this after I’ve had a chance to at least use the toilet?

For my part, inspiration for this entry came about when His Royal Highness asked me to look at him while he was speaking. In other words, give him my undivided attention. Mind you, I had woken at the usual time of seven, walked our daughter to school and walked myself home in the drizzling rain, opened my laptop expecting to do some writing when his insistent voice came from our couch.

“What’s more important than your husband?” is his favourite phrase. He’s a Leo. This morning it was, “What’s three more days?”

Nothing, if you have been spending weekdays and weekends by your self for the last five years! “Just concentrate on your exams,” said I, hoping he’d leave me alone.

“Come over here and let’s talk.”

“Why don’t you just, just, just … ” What was a good phrase for asking your spouse to get lost without hurting his feelings? “Just try and centre yourself. Meditate.”

“Come over here.”

“Look, I don’t want to get into an argument with you before the exam. If you keep insisting, I am going to get cross and we will have one.” Perhaps I was edgy because I had heard from his colleagues that he is as good an operator as those who passed on the first go, and if not for being continually picked on for his less than impressive command of English, would have long passed.

“Fine. Wake me up at eleven. My exam is at twelve.”

And with that good people of the world, peace was restored in the palace. His Royal Highness had his nap and I managed to get some work done.